


this place is a shelter

by thehollowones



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Christmas, F/M, Friendship is Magic, Hogwarts Eighth Year, Magic as Metaphor, Male-Female Friendship, Post-Second War with Voldemort, Suicidal Thoughts, Weasley Family Christmas, angst with happy ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-25
Updated: 2016-11-25
Packaged: 2018-09-02 05:12:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8652295
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thehollowones/pseuds/thehollowones
Summary: Harry Potter can do many things. Magic is no longer one of them.





	

**Author's Note:**

> There are brief, plot-related thoughts of suicide in this fic. Please be safe.

Harry sat surrounded by strangers, staring past the old rain marbled on the window to the street beyond. It was the end of the afternoon coffee rush. Hermione was due to arrive any minute. He closed his eyes, listening to the carols playing over the coffee shop’s stereo. He could sit there forever, alone and anonymous. Someone a few tables over gave a grating laugh, his eyes flew open, and Hermione was standing on the other side of the glass.

She was clearly dressed for a Hogwarts winter, flecks of snow still caught on her coat. She looked the same as ever – perhaps a little more rested, her jeans filled out a little better – with her bushy hair frizzing out in the damp. She hitched the strap of her bag further up her shoulder, dodged a power walker and pushed open the door.

Hermione spotted him at once, but her eyes flicked nervously around the room before she waved. She threaded her way through the other customers to sink down in the arm chair opposite Harry’s.

“This is nice,” she said approvingly. “Do you come here often?”

“Not often enough that they know me.”

Hermione’s eyebrows raised in that earnest look she got when talking about a pet project. “How are you? Have you had any luck with,” she looked around, then leaned forwards, “spell work?”  
Resentment flared hot in him. Not even a minute, and Hermione had started to pick at him. He took a sip from his mug, stalling. His tea had gone cold.

“Have you been practising?”

Harry put his mug down with enough force that the half empty contents sloshed over the side. Hermione frowned.

“Look, can we just go?” Harry aimed for a conciliatory tone. Hermione nodded, still looking put out.

They left the coffee shop. Hermione grabbed his hand and led him around the corner into a dirty laneway. 

“You should really get your Apparition License,” she said.

“Can’t.”

“The test’s really easy.”

“Hermione, I can’t.” She seemed to sag a little. Harry was suddenly reminded that he was the taller of the two by a good inch. Not looking at him, Hermione lifted their joined hands, as though to check they were still holding on.

“Yes you can,” she said and pulled him into nothingness.  
-  
“Harry! Hermione!” A mass of red hair and robes greeted them in the Weasley kitchen, everyone reaching for a hug or handshake. All of the Weasley children were present and all were pleased to see them. The only awkward moment came when Ron couldn’t decide whether to kiss or hug Hermione, and ended up half-doing both. He slunk off to a corner with his ears burning red. Finally, only Ginny was standing in front of them, her hair in a complicated braid.

She threw her arms around Hermione and they embraced, swaying a little. Then Ginny drew back to press her fingers to Hermione’s cheek. It was a surprisingly womanly gesture, like something Mrs. Weasley might do, tempered by the fact that the long, floppy sleeves of her jumper completely covered her hands. She smiled like the sharp crack of a glow stick and Harry’s awareness narrowed to the ribs coiled tight beneath his skin, and the beating of his heart, and Ginny.

“Missed you.”

“Missed you.”

“You do realize,” called Charlie from the living room, “that you just spent four months cooped up in school together?”

Ginny rolled her eyes. Only then, head turned away from him, did she say “Hello, Harry.”

He probably deserved it.

Eventually they crowded around the table, talking over each other, laughing. Charlie filled Harry in on the wizarding version of a doping scandal that had recently overtaken the Scottish International team. They took a moment of spontaneous silence over the dreary prospects of British Quidditch as a whole and over the din Harry clearly heard Mr. Weasley call “pass the potatoes, someone, please?”

Harry felt his face begin to flush, sweat prickling at his hairline. He was afraid to move, to breathe, because the potatoes were right in front of his plate, and by “pass,” Mr. Weasley clearly meant levitate, and this was something he could not do.

The platter of roasted potatoes began to rise smoothly in the air, then turned and skimmed over the table to the other end. Across from him, Hermione had her wand out and her anxious eyes on Harry. For a moment, they just watched each other. Then she turned and asked Fleur about ongoing repairs to the cottage.

It was as though all the color had leached out of the room and they day was as gray as one spent alone in Grimmauld Place. Around him, people ate and bickered, and he was somehow separate from them. Didn’t they understand that there was no point in eating? In laughing, talking, sitting at a table? He looked down at his plate and was repulsed by the half-eaten food.  
Ron kicked him under the table. Harry realized that he had been sitting with a piece of carrot half-way to his mouth.

“Can you tell your mum I wasn’t feeling well and went to bed?”

Ron looked around at Hermione, who managed to both send him a darkly significant look and chat with Fleur.

“Of course, mate,” Ron said.

Harry pushed his chair back silently. He left his plate on the table so anyone watching would think he was headed for the loo. He took a sharp right at the living room door to climb the stairs to Ron’s bedroom. Nobody tried to stop him.

He dreamt of the tent. They were all together: he and Ron and Hermione. They weren’t hungry in the dream. They weren’t scared or angry at each other. They were just there, together, nestled inside a silent forest. The dream lacked a structure or plot. Hermione read her book, twirling a strand of hair absently around her finger. Ron sat at the mouth of the tent, watching the snow swirl. Harry watched his friends. Time stretched out like chewing gum.

A scream rent the night.

Harry was up and out of bed before he was fully conscious, his wand clutched uselessly in his fist. He swept his hand over the blankets searching for his glasses.

“Harry,” Ron said, “it’s just George.”

Harry squinted in the darkness. He could just make out Ron’s blanketed silhouette in the blue pre-dawn light. Ron hadn’t even lifted his head from his pillow.

“What do you mean, just George?”

Ron rolled over the face him, eyes glinting. “Nightmare. Happens every time he sleeps here. Go back to sleep.”

There was another scream that stuttered at the end, as though turning into a sob. Harry shut his eyes, trying to hear through the floors that separated George’s room from Ron’s, not quite convinced that there wasn’t a threat. He thought he could hear low voices, but nobody was pounding down the stairs to investigate. All the house must have known about George’s nightmares.  
“Isn’t there anything we can do?” he asked.

“No,” Ron said, shortly.

Harry climbed back onto his cot, heart still pounding, feeling wretched. How much he had missed, shut up in Grimmauld Place all these months. There had to be something he could do. He realized he was still clutching his wand. He listened hard. Ron’s breathing had evened and slowed.

“Lumos,” he whispered. The darkness stayed close around him.

“Harry,” Ron said. “You should tell them.”

He fell asleep trying to think of a response.

-  
“Harry, it’s almost noon. Seamus and Dean are here.”

Harry groaned as Ron’s footsteps receded, pressing his face into his pillow. He was tired down to his bones. It was the kind of exhaustion that makes breathing a chore, never mind a visit from old school friends. He got up in stages: first sitting upright, then swinging his legs over onto the floor, then finally pushing himself up with his hands on his knees. So it was going to be one of those days.

The younger Weasleys, Hermione, Seamus and Dean were assembled in the living room. Ginny and George were sitting by the fire, having an involved discussion. Ginny kept motioning with her hands. Harry found himself staring at the both of them and looked away. Dean, Seamus and Ron were huddled on the floor over a wizarding chess set. Dean was the first to notice Harry and he sprang to his feet. They shook hands heartily.

“How’ve you been? What’ve you been up to?”

“Cleaning out my godfather’s house,” said Harry.

“But can’t you just,” Dean made a sweeping gesture, “magic it clean?”

Harry’s stomach rose up to his throat. He was suddenly very grateful he missed breakfast.

“Dark artefacts,” Ron called. “Really nasty stuff. Dean, come save Seamus from himself, please.”

They spent the next hour chattering amongst themselves. Dean and Seamus were full of Hogwarts stories, having both gone back for eighth year, although their sort of story was very  
different from Hermione’s highly technical retellings of her favorite lessons.

Harry ended up watching Dean, not having anything to add to the conversation. He noticed several very strange things. Dean couldn’t seem to keep still, always jiggling his leg or tapping his fingers. He kept shooting glances at Seamus, then looking away just as quickly. Another oddity was the distance between Dean and Seamus. They kept a good inch of space between them at all times. Harry remembered them always sprawling all over each other at school. He wondered if perhaps they were having a spat.

Even the combined efforts of Dean and Seamus couldn’t take more than a bishop off Ron and they soon had to concede. As Seamus corralled his grumbling pieces back into their box, Dean said “hey Harry, did you know Luna’s dating Parvati’s sister?”

Harry didn’t know this and said as much. Ron looked thoughtful. “Didn’t know she swung that way,” he said. “Mind you, she’s always been odd.”

Ginny looked up, eyes narrowed dangerously and Dean seemed to rock backwards as though he’d been slapped, but Hermione beat them to it.

“Honestly Ron, is there no end to your ignorance?” Ron looked startled, then hurt, and opened up his mouth to argue.

“Quidditch,” Ginny said, loudly. Everyone began to look around for their outer layers except Dean, who was still sitting on the floor.

“Aren’t you coming?” Seamus asked Harry.

“Shoulder injury,” he said.

Seamus grabbed his coat and went out the door. Hermione shut Theoretical Arithmancy and got up, heading for Harry. She squeezed Dean’s shoulder as she passed, which seemed to call him back to the present. She bent down by Harry’s chair.

“You can get on a broom. It will still work.”

Harry shook his head. “I’m tired.”

Hermione looked back and forth between his eyes like she was trying to catch at least one of them in a lie. Whatever she saw reassured her and she followed Dean out of the room. The front door slammed and the house became quiet enough that Harry could hear Mrs. Weasley humming on the floor above him.

“I’m not angry, you know.” Ginny, who had been rendered invisible by the large armchair facing the fire, stuck her head over its back to look at Harry. Then she swung over the arm and came to sit beside him on the couch. Harry was uncomfortable aware of the positions of all of his limbs.

Ginny sat for awhile, looking thoughtfully down at her hands. Then she said, “I’m just sad.”

“Ginny, I’m sorry I never wrote back to you. I kept all of your letters. There was… I’ve been…”

“I’m sad for the both of us.” She looked at Harry with her clear dark eyes. She was close enough Harry could see the spray of freckles on her cheeks. “You didn’t love me.”  
“I didn’t?” Harry felt rather affronted. Her lips twitched.

“How could you have? We were children. I didn’t love you either.” She sounded very matter of fact.

Ginny was wrong, of course. He had loved her. He loved her for her ferocity and her darkness and her kindness. He loved her sense of humor and they way her hair caught and trapped the sunlight. But she was also right. When he had gone to his death in that forest, the part of him that loved Ginny Weasley had gone with him, and he knew better than anyone that he had not come back whole.

“I’m sad too,” he said. Ginny lay her head on his shoulder.

“We’ll never be children again,” she said, as though she was trying the thought out for the very first time.  
-  
Harry awoke in time for breakfast the next morning. This surprised him as he had gotten used to sleeping until noon everyday rather than face another morning doing not much of anything. But there was always noise at the Burrow – the ghoul clanking, a crack of apparition, a duel brewing – and something or other had woken him.

Dean and Seamus had left the night before, leaving only the Weasleys, Hermione and Fleur to fill the kitchen. Harry sat down next to someone he was pretty sure was Bill, though his face was completely hidden behind the Daily Prophet.

“He lives,” George said, wandering in with his toothbrush in his hand and only one sock on. “What was that, twelve hours sleep? You have the bladder capacity of a champion, young Harry.”  
Harry chucked a piece of toast at him then looked around guiltily at Mrs. Weasley, who had her back turned. George caught the toast awkwardly in the hand holding the toothbrush and slid a chair out, creating a drawn out screech.

“Owl,” Mrs. Weasley called, throwing open the window above the sink to let it in. It was large, black and unfriendly looking. Mrs. Weasley untied the letter from the owl’s leg and scanned the envelope. “It’s for Hermione.”

Hermione jumped up and grabbed her letter. Without reading it, she sat back down and set to work cutting up her sausages. There was a slight flush high on her cheeks.  
“Mm, who’s that from?” asked Ginny, propping her head up with her hand. Ron snorted.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“If you have something to say, Ron, say it,” said Hermione.

“How is Vicky these days?” said Ron, glaring at her. “What, you think I don’t notice you getting owls every hour of the day and night? You think I don’t-, “

“Ron,” said Bill, warningly.

“I have gotten two letters since I’ve been here. Two, and neither of them are anywhere near your business. But really,” Hermione’s voice was now very shrill, “I should be congratulating you, Ron. You went a day and a half without a jealous outburst! That’s a real accomplishment for someone as muddle-headed, temperamental-, “

“Let’s take a walk!” Harry said. Nobody took any notice of him. George was watching RonHermione with an expression of professional interest, like an anthropologist encountering a new tribe. Everyone else was similarly occupied, and so no one but Harry noticed the second owl, carrying a blood red letter in its beak. It began smoking at once and the owl dropped it, shrieking. 

“CHARLIE WEASLEY! HAVE YOU EVER MET A PROBLEM YOU CAN’T SHAG YOUR WAY INTO?” The female voice filled the kitchen. Charlie lunged for the letter and ran out the door leaving a stunned silence in his wake. Harry got up and went over to Hermione. He reached to grab her hand, but thought better of it under the circumstances and tugged on her upper arm. “Hermione, we’re going outside.”

She whipped her mane of hair around to face him, eyes wide with anger. “Get off!”

“Walk with me,” he insisted. Reluctantly, she stood up.

“We are not finished here,” she hissed at Ron. Hermione stalked out of the kitchen, trembling with rage, her letter crushed in her fist. Harry followed.

Hermione walked very fast in the opposite direction of the still yelling Howler. Harry trailed after her, watching his breath mist in front of him. Neither of them had put on a jacket. Harry’s hands had gone numb by the time she rounded on him.

“You know, it’s stupid to stay shut up in that old house, and avoid your friends. And why haven’t you told the Weasleys about your- your problem?”

Harry blinked at her. “How did this become about me?”

“Fine,” she snapped. “You say something.”

Harry thought. “Do you ever worry that the shower floor will give way and you’ll fall into this, like, dark pit full of bugs?”

“What!?”

“Just something I think about.” He grinned at her. Hermione stared blankly back, then scrubbed at her face with both hands.

“Why am I so mean to him?” she asked, voice muffled.

“Because… you love him?”

Hermione shook her head back and forth a few times. She dropped her hands and looked at him, mouth pulled into the grimace she made when she was holding back tears.

“Is love supposed to be suffocating?”

“I wouldn’t know,” said Harry, sulkier than he had intended. Hermione sniffed.

“Ginny told you her theory?” Hermione asked. “Oh God, maybe I should date her. At least she’s got her head on straight.

“We technically broke up yesterday. Isn’t there some kind of grace period before you can date my ex?”

Hermione gave a shaky laugh. Her eyes suddenly widened and she stuck both hands out, palms up, and studied them intently.

“Look,” she said in a hushed voice, sticking her right hand under Harry’s nose. It held a single, fast melting snowflake.  
-  
The snowflake quickly became a blinding flurry. George kept rushing out of the house and returning to announce that it was not quite snowball fight conditions yet. Mr. Weasley was in an even better mood than usual that evening as he contemplated having the next three day’s holidays.

Harry kept to himself. He had discovered that if he appeared intently interested in whatever chess match, mock duel or game the others were taking part in, he didn’t have to do anything more than exist. Hermione seemed to be on to him, however. She kept shooting him meaningful glances from under her eyelashes and he finally went up to bed just to avoid a confrontation.  
He nearly smacked into George at the bottom of the stairs. It was very early for bed and George gave him a challenging look, as though daring him to say something well-meaning. Harry swept his arm out to indicate that George should go first.

He reached Ron’s landing and attempted to enter his room. No matter how he rattled the door knob, the door remained locked. He looked down the stairs, but Ron would be with the others for hours still. He didn’t think he could face going downstairs to ask Ron to unlock a door for him. There was only one thing to do.

He held his wand in his fist, pointed at the door. He tried to feel once again the magic thrilling through his body, coursing through his veins like blood and sugar. He pictured himself at eleven, standing in Ollivander’s, the back of his neck prickling as he held his wand for the very first time.

“Alohamora.”

The door remained locked.  
-  
Ron’s snores had kept him awake into the early hours of Christmas morning. With every one of his exhales came a drawn out snort that made Harry grit his teeth in annoyance. Sometimes there would come a breath without the sound, getting his hopes up, but the snuffling, wheezing, snorting would start right back up. Feeling like he might smother Ron if he had to listen to him any longer, Harry got out of bed. He wasn’t feeling charitable enough to be quiet about it. He grabbed his bag and went out onto the landing.

The stairs were darker than Ron’s room had been with no windows to let in the moonlight. Harry trailed his fingers along the wall, feeling the rough paper, navigating the steps by instinct and memory. His eyes felt strained by the gloom.

The living room was lit by glass balls filled with blue and purple flames that clung to the ceiling and by strings of fairy lights wrapped around the Christmas tree. Harry stuck his hand in his bag, then his entire arm up to the elbow, feeling around in the cavernous space Hermione’s spell work had created for his wrapped presents.

His hand struck something smooth that toppled over, making a rattling noise. Harry thought there was a chance it was the jumbo box of Bertie Bott’s Beans that he had purchased for Ron. He groped around for it, grabbed on and pulled it out, although he could tell by then the dimensions were wrong. It was a bottle of painkillers.

He held it in his hand, considering it. AA terrible thought had struck him. His heart began to beat even faster than it did when Ginny used to smile at him from across the common room.

He sat down on the couch, holding the bottle tight. Not now, surely? Not at Christmas? But what better time than when he had everyone he loved around him, under the same roof?

“Harry?”

Hermione was standing in the doorway, her nightgown falling just past her knees, her face shadowed by wandlight. “What’s the matter?”

Harry said nothing. She came to sit beside him, taking the hand that wasn’t grasping the pill bottle. Her fingers were cool and slightly damp. Harry held on tight, hot tears suddenly pressing at his eyes.

“I can’t do magic, Hermione.”

“I know.” Harry looked at her startled. Hermione had consulted every specialist, had buried them both in books until their eyes ached. Had never admitted that he had lost something he might never get back. She squeezed his hand. Her eyes were steady. “I know.”

Harry tilted his head back and watched the flames on the ceiling blur. He raised the fist holding the pills and brushed the back of it roughly beneath his eyes, skewing his glasses. 

Hermione grabbed onto the pill bottle. She tugged until he relinquished it. He heard the pills rattling in her hand.

“Let’s go away,” she said. She pulled her head back to look at Harry. The fairy lights brightened her eyes like tears. “Let’s go far away. Please, Harry, you’re my best friend. Please, please Harry, you’re my best friend. We’ll go anywhere you want.”

“Hermione.”

“Why not?”

“Because…” How could he explain the feeling of never being able to escape himself? “Because I’d still be there.”

Hermione squeezed her eyes shut and made a high-pitched noise in the back of her throat. Harry turned and wrapped both arms around her as she shook.

“You can’t leave me,” she sobbed.

“Never,” he promised.  
-  
“Wake up.”

Harry opened his eyes, disoriented. Daylight had streaked across the room. There was a weight pressed against his right side from shoulder to knee. He turned and got a face full of bushy hair. He moved his head to the left and saw Ron staring back at him, crouched down by the sofa.

He felt the first stirrings of dread low in his stomach. What would this look like to Ron, who had always inclined towards jealousy? But Ron’s expression was placid as he asked “everything alright? You could have woken me.”

Hermione groaned, elbowing Harry in the side as she raised a hand to cover her eyes.

“Merry Christmas!” Ginny appeared in Harry’s line of sight. “What did you all get me?”

It took a half hour for the Weasley family to assemble, everyone but Fleur and Percy in their dressing gowns. Harry was assigned to the position of Present Giver Outer which meant he had to wear a too-big Father Christmas hat as he dragged gifts out from under the tree.

The room seemed to hum. People were trying on their new Weasley sweaters or surreptitiously getting started on their candy hauls. Fleur did neither, but she wore an indulgent look.

The stunned gnome that served as a tree topper suddenly came tumbling down, eyes rolling madly. It struck a glass ornament that struck the floor by Harry’s foot and shattered, the gnome not far behind.

“Oh, who put that up? Honestly, Charlie- Harry, put him back, would you dear?”

Ron’s wand was already out and pointed when Harry said “I can’t.”

He was tired of hiding and being afraid. He thought of how much Hermione loved him, and how much Ron trusted him. Feeling he might as well do the thing properly, he said “I can’t do magic. I haven’t cast a spell since the day Voldemort died.”

The room went silent, save for Percy who was still talking about fraudulent amulets. Bill smacked him in the arm to shut him up. Mrs. Weasley had a hand over her mouth. Harry very deliberately didn’t look at Ginny. Instead, he looked to his friends, both of whom were smiling at him, eyes bright with pride.

Bill flicked his wand and the gnome flew back to its perch.

“Anyone else have something they need to get off their chests?” asked George. There were a few nervous titters.

“My letter was from Malfoy,” Hermione said very fast. “We talk all the time at school and he’s trying really hard not to be awful and you should have coffee with us, Ron.”

“Malfoy- coffee- writing!” Ron spluttered.

Ginny stood up, eyes blazing. She went up to Harry and put her fingers to his cheek. This time it didn’t seem odd. She had grown into the gesture, this girl he knew, this woman he loved. She wrapped her arms around his waist. He held her close, feeling her shoulder blades under his fingertips.

For a moment, he felt it.

Magic.


End file.
